Hollis students have started reading this year's Chickadee Book Award nominees! The Chickadee Book Award is an opportunity for Maine readers in grades K - 4 to be the judges of a state book award. Each year, the Chickadee Book Award committee selects 10 picture books for the reading list. In the spring, students vote for their favorite from the list, with the winning book announced in early April.

3rd graders at Hollis began our Chickadee Book Award unit by reading the book Memoirs of a Parrot by Devin Scillian. This fun story, told in a diary format, is narrated by a sarcastic parrot who is initially unhappy with his new owner. After reading this book, the students began creating their own memoir-style stories using animals of their choice. Once they have completed the writing piece, they'll use Buncee to share their stories.

Last week 1st and 2nd graders at Hollis heard the book The Branch by Mireille Messier. This sweet story is about how a little girl, upset that her favorite branch broke in an ice storm, found a creative way to make the branch into something new. After listening to this story, the 1st and 2nd grader made their own branch creations. We had a lot of great ideas for ways to use a broken branch!

Each year, at the American Library Association midwinter meeting, several children's book award winners announced. Among these are the Newbery and Caldecott Medals, two of the most famous awards for children's books.

This year's midwinter meeting will be held in February in Denver. In preparation of the announcement of the children's book award winners, I spend library time going over these book awards with our learners, sharing with them examples of books that have won these prestigious awards in previous years.

Last year, Hollis 4th graders looked at Caldecott eligible books in the library and voted for the ones that they thought should win. Because they were so enthusiastic about that unit last year, I decided to do a similar one with this year's 4th graders at Hollis and GEJ!

Our Mock Caldecott unit began two weeks ago and will continue for several more weeks. We began by learning about the history of the Caldecott as well as how the 15 judges evaluate and select the winner and honor books. Last week the 4th graders began to evaluate books that are eligible to win the 2018 Caldecott, using the same criteria the official Caldecott judges use.

After evaluating the 16 books selected for our Mock Caldecott, learners will then each select their 1st, 2nd, and 3rd place choices. We will then use their choices to select our Mock Caldecott winner and honor books. Once the official winners are announced on February 12th, we will get to see if any of our choices were named winner or honor book!

Our learners have been having a great time reading and evaluating the 16 books I selected for this unit. I love listening to them discuss the books with each other and sharing their thoughts about the stories and illustrations!

​We are making excellent progress in the bookcase replacement project at the George E. Jack library! Thanks to the generous contributions of donors on DonorsChoose, we now have eight new bookcases, with two more set to arrive within the next two weeks. The addition of these new bookcases, which are replacing the older shelving units in the library, have made a wonderful difference in both the appearance and the use of the library!

Here are before and after pictures of our library:

Our completed DonorsChoose projects allowed for the replacement of two of the old book units (in the first photograph) to be replaced with the new blue and yellow bookcases in the second picture! We are now working towards replacing the third (and final) of the original three units and currently have another DonorsChoose project for several more new bookcases. It is very exciting to watch the library transform with these beautiful new bookcases!

Mrs. Daigle's 1st grade concluded our library alligator unit with a wonderful Skype! Author Julie Falatko, who writes the Snappsy the Alligator series, chatted with us yesterday about her Snappsy books. She also read aloud the second Snappsy book, Snappsy the Alligator and His Best Friend Forever (Probably). Thank you Ms. Falatko for taking the time to chat with our learners!

What is the Global Postcard Exchange? It's an opportunity for classes around the nation and world to connect with each other through postcards! Each participating class is matched with classes in other states and countries. They then design and send a postcard to each class they are matched with. The postcards must also include the answers to several questions about their school/community/state, allowing the participating classes to compare their schools and communities with others.

Last year Hollis 3rd and 4th graders participated in the postcard exchange and we received postcards from nearly 30 other classes! This year GEJ 5th graders are having the opportunity to make connections to classes all over the globe. Our postcards will be sent to states around the nation as well as several other countries, including Australia and Germany!

Students are now working on their postcard designs. Some are choosing to draw their own design, while others are using Buncee to digitally create their postcard. All of them are looking wonderful! I'm looking forward to sending our postcards to our new friends as well as receiving ones from our buddy classes!